Basketry: A Collaboration of Nature and Creative Genius
October 4 - December 12, 2007

The C.N. Gorman Museum is pleased to present the works
of 26 Native American weavers from throughout Northern and Central California.
The exhibition includes numerous pieces from the Hailstone Collection,
developed over decades of teaching and collaboration by master weaver
Vivien Hailstone (1913-2000) and more recently by Albert Hailstone. Guest
Curator, Kathy Wallace brings this rich collection together with works
by contemporary weavers.

Made of natural sources, such as willow,
conifer root, bear grass, woodwardia fern, maidenhair fern, hazel,
porcupine quill, devil’s
claw, and deer grass, the baskets are truly a collaboration of nature
and creative genius. Some date back to the early 1900’s, many
are from the 1940-80s, and others are more recent creations. One of
the extraordinary aspects of this exhibition is that all of the baskets
are held in Native American family collections, with the exception
of the Modoc/Pit River Collection housed in the the C.N. Gorman Museum
permanent collections, and most have not been exhibited previously.

Meet the weavers at a Special Reception,
as part of the California Indian Conference on
Friday, October 26th @ 4pm

Kathy Wallace
Guest Curator

Kathy Wallace has been making traditional Karuk,
Yurok and Hupa baskets for twenty-five years. Nearly a decade ago,
she sold a thriving commercial business to devote her life full-time
to weaving. As one of the founding “mothers” of the California
Basketweavers Association, Wallace is working to revive basketweaving
among California tribes, as well as protect the practice of the art
itself. She is helping to accomplish this through instructional workshops
on Northern California Native culture and basketry. In 2006-7, she
was a Visiting Artist and Lecturer in the Department of Native American
Studies at UCD.

As a practicing artist,
Kathy harvests the native plant materials for her work utilizing
ancestral knowledge that has been passed down to her. It is this
ritualized practice that drives her efforts to educate lawmakers
and state and federal agencies on the hazards of pesticide spraying
in the traditional gathering areas located in the forests and wetlands
of Northern California. She also works to ensure that controlled
burns are conducted in certain areas to ensure on-going plant regeneration.

About the Hailstone Collection

Master basketweaver Vivien Hailstone
(1913-2000) was Yurok, Karuk, and a member of the Hupa tribe. She
was instrumental in continuing and teaching the weaving traditions
of her communities for over twenty years. During that time, she developed
a large personal collection of artworks by fellow weavers from her
area which when she passed in 2000 was brought together with pieces
acquired by her son Albert to form the Hailstone Collection.

One of the exceptional qualities
of this collection is the attribution of individual weavers for many
of the pieces. Also beneficial are instances where there are several
examples by the same artist, such as the tobacco baskets by Amy Smoker
(Yurok), where the viewer is enabled to perceive stylistic distinctions
between artists, communities and more generally regionally.

This exhibition would not have been
possible without the generosity of Albert Hailstone in loaning so
many extraordinary works from this important collection.